Looking for some help and advice. My wife and I moved into a house back in November, a huge Victorian terrace. Aroud January, I began to notice scratch marks on the walls in random place and some quite high up. The scratches would wipe off easily with a moist cloth.

We have 3 floors in our house, I sometimes wake up in the early hours because it sounds like somebody is running up and down the second staircase, it's really loud! I don't get up to investigate. We also notice things going missing, sometime we find them and sometimes we dont. One morning, I got up early, used the bathroom and went out for a walk. I came back to find a cardboard box in the middle of the bathroom floor, it was wound really tight so it was formed into a tube. My wife was working away, so it wasn't her playing games with me.

The thing is, before we moved here, we also had funny goings on at our other house with the kitchen light turning itself on and off.

Do you think there is something in our house and could it have followed us from our last place? If so, what can we do? We try to ignore it so it doesn't get worse.

I think you should get up in the middle of the night to investigate those stairs. I've seen some very creepy videos about people living in the house that pop out while the owners are asleep or away to do things like use the bathroom and eat the food, and otherwise screw with the owners. Try to be as silent as possible when you do this so make sure all doors are oiled and the like before you do it. And try to avoid any creaky floor boards. Make sure you take a weapon with you just in case. Once you rule out a living person, then we can start working on the supernatural stuff.

The kitchen light could just have been a short circuit.

When stuff like this happens, those on this forum always try to rule out the doings of the living before we move on to the supernatural. Because lets face it, some people are just horrible and you could have someone living in the crawl space or attic or something.

I think you should get up in the middle of the night to investigate those stairs. I've seen some very creepy videos about people living in the house that pop out while the owners are asleep or away to do things like use the bathroom and eat the food, and otherwise screw with the owners. Try to be as silent as possible when you do this so make sure all doors are oiled and the like before you do it. And try to avoid any creaky floor boards. Make sure you take a weapon with you just in case. Once you rule out a living person, then we can start working on the supernatural stuff.

The kitchen light could just have been a short circuit.

When stuff like this happens, those on this forum always try to rule out the doings of the living before we move on to the supernatural. Because lets face it, some people are just horrible and you could have someone living in the crawl space or attic or something.

Please let us know what happens.

Hi and many thanks for your reply.

It did cross my mind about somebody possibly being in the crawl space or something like that. However, having been in the crawl space myself, I can confirm that nobody is in there, just some of our things, there's hardly any room in there. When I say it sounds like somebody is running up and down the stairs, I mean it sounds like bigfoot or something.

The kitchen light at our old place was ruled out as a short circuit, the switch would flick itself!

The scratches on the walls aren't near any specific location either, they appear low down or near the ceiling.

As mentioned, if you can rule out an intruder, good locks, security, etc. ..... then you could possibly have something supernatural going on. I can easily see an old 3 story Victorian home being haunted. And if that's the case, I think it wants to make it clear that it lives there too! Probably the best thing to do is acknowledge it. Don't offer to share your home however, because it's yours now. And since you don't know what you're dealing with, you really don't want to have communication with it. So I would suggest the next time you experience a sign of it being there, speak out and nicely say that you love your new home, you paid a lot of money for it and you will take good care of it. But please understand that I won't share it. So I ask respectfully that you now leave..

interesting about the lights at your past residence, but at this stage I'd be dealing with the old/new separately, unless there's a reason you think they may be connected? Have you worked with evp's or tried to communicate with spirits previously?

Definitely a good idea to rule out non-paranormal explanations first. Let us know how you go!

Jim@GhostStudy, please can you clarify? You say to acknowledge it but not communicate with it. Please can you just explain this a bit more, I don't want to get it wrong. I'm worried that acknowledging it would be communicating.

earthlydelites, Yes, I have tried to communicate with spirits once before. I used to live in the county of Pendle in the UK, which is famous for the Pendle Witch trials in 1612. That is also where the lights would go on and off in the kitchen. My wife and I once visited the site of the witches house and performed an EVP. We did get some results, which were a male voice asking "Who are you?" when I asked if anyone was with us and a female voice replied later in the recording saying, "I'm here." My wife was also filming it on a fully charged video camera, which switched itself off about three quarters of the way through the EVP session. We lost the whole video recording as a result, but luckily I was recording the EVP audio seperately. Do you think it could be connected?

We recorded the EVPs mid to late 2013. I'll be honest, the light in the kitchen started not long after that. We did put crystal around our house as we read that it can keep negative energy away and such and it appeared to work, but we haven't put it out since we moved house. Honestly, I don't even know where the crystal is at this point.

As for disharmony, my wife's doctor suspects she may have an auto-immune disease, which she is currently undergoing tests for. However, symptoms began around the same time as the activity. She's constantly drained of energy and constantly coming down with colds and infections. I've heard of this kind of thing being related but I haven't mentioned anything to my wife about it.

Wow cool! As long as you do not feel threatened you should consider yourself very lucky to have a home ghost

I personally do not think much about sounds on a stairwell or even most sounds of walking on floors, in attics or on roofs The way these things are constructed lends them well to creaky noises from thermal expansion and contraction. Then what you find is the "walking" path follows the longer support beams and on a staircase it's pretty much a given PLUS stair wells often amplify the sound.

I'm not saying it's not a ghost it's just the audio equivalent of orbs many times.

Also lights turning on and off is common as a minor short or switch issue BUT also with new bulbs the circuitry can cause issues especially with LED bulbs near the end of their circuit and you can get weird strobing as well.

So with the standard skeptic bits out of the way since you are familiar with EVPs you should definitely do that at home

I would also recommend a nice little wifi camera ... though I recommend these even without a ghost You can get a decent one for under $50 {$20 to $30 without night vision} and they are great security monitors and you can check in on your home with your cellphone. Of course you can aim it down your stairs and perhaps get ghost pics, video and or audio depending on the camera.

If your stairs are wooden or uncarpeted you may want to consider sprinkling talc/baby powder on a few steps then check in the morning for prints. You can use flour too but there is the possibility of moisture and bugs causing problems.

On the other hand if you have carpeted stairs I recommend putting down a siguie brand kitty trap ... it's just a lot of post it notes with the sticky part facing up. Incidentally this is a great way to catch or torment a kitty

Sherinator... yes, let me clarify concerning acknowledging vs communicating. Communicating suggests an open discussion and trust me, you almost never want that. You're the only speaker and there's never a reason for a response, nor should you seek for one. You only acknowledge it's presence (as outlined in my earlier post). It's probably screaming for recognition!

So you give it that moment or it may never settle down or leave. You acknowledge it's presence and talk about how much you appreciate this beautiful home and how you will be living here now. Then mention how you will take good care of it (the home). But make it clear that it's your home now and you paid a lot of money for it. Then continue, but I and my family live here now and we're not willing to share. So I now ask that you and any others with you, leave and allow us peace. May God bless you in your travels... Goodbye.

The only other time you may want to speak/yell out at this spirit/ghost is if under some type of attack. And it's not a bad thing to throw out the name of the 'Lord' if you are of a religious persuasion.

As for a connection between this haunting and your old house, I wouldn't expect there to be one. Are there a lot of similarities between this haunting and the other? Is there something you may have done at the old house to invite something into your life? If so, we may want to explore those possibilities.

Please stick around and we'll try to get to the bottom of all of this. .

As for EVP's... I don't encourage people to try that in their own homes. If there's something nasty there, it can leverage your attempt as an invitation. And you really don't want that where you live, IMO. I have personally had some success with EVP's in haunted environments, but like I said, I'm not willing to try it at home. But that's just my take on it..

Jim@GhostStudy, please can you clarify? You say to acknowledge it but not communicate with it. Please can you just explain this a bit more, I don't want to get it wrong. I'm worried that acknowledging it would be communicating.

earthlydelites, Yes, I have tried to communicate with spirits once before. I used to live in the county of Pendle in the UK, which is famous for the Pendle Witch trials in 1612. That is also where the lights would go on and off in the kitchen. My wife and I once visited the site of the witches house and performed an EVP. We did get some results, which were a male voice asking "Who are you?" when I asked if anyone was with us and a female voice replied later in the recording saying, "I'm here." My wife was also filming it on a fully charged video camera, which switched itself off about three quarters of the way through the EVP session. We lost the whole video recording as a result, but luckily I was recording the EVP audio seperately. Do you think it could be connected?

Thanks.

Edited for spelling error.

Would you be interested in sharing the audio? get a 2nd ear on it. In private if you want. No Yes Maybe?

@trin. Yes, we have a carbon monoxide detector. In fact, we have 2 of them . The house was checked before we bought it, it's law to have a survey done beforehand here in the UK. No problems found.

@earthlydelites. Increase or decrease? Well, I'd say that things are the same except for one recent development. A few days ago, I found a picture of my wife and I from our first Christmas, so I framed it and put it in my "Man Cave". On a few occassions, when I have left the room for a couple of minutes and come back, the picture is in the middle of the floor. It's not fallen off the wall as I would have heard it. No, it's been placed neatly in the middle of the floor, always facing up in the same position. The first time I happened, I thought it must've fallen off the wall, but when I hung it back up I checked that it was definitely secure. Besides, it's held up by a picture hook and there's a string on the back of the frame.

In regards to the EVP, I'm perfectly willing to share it. Can anyone tell me how to upload attachments on here?